Awake With Clean Clothes

2005-05-12 3:26 a.m.

I know the drunken bum you�ve grown to know so well seems to have been on hiatus for quite some time. More than seems. He�s been laid up on a park bench under some miscellaneous flickering street light for over a month now - brown bag of middle shelf liquor under his arm and a pack of smokes peeking from his shirt pocket. I promise you he�s been more than satisfied through my last couple months in NY and my first week in Chicago�

Nothing to worry about. He�s still hangin around in the strobed shadows. He lifts the brim of his hat once in a while to glance over to see if I need a hand. I nod back with an assured glance that his time will return, but for now he can fall back to a thunderous snore.

If he�s missed, I could offer to wake him, but I assure you a raging drunk with a hangover from a 2 month binge who just slept on a park bench with a fucked up light flashing over his head won�t be the best of company.

These days I hear the awakening of a few voices that have been hibernating for far longer than I�d hoped, but exactly as long as needed. The voices of emotion, reason and creativity woke with the sun the moment I left my old cell and though they may be slow to rise, they�re well rested and excited about what the day will bring.

There�s quite a few voices that bounce around in my head, actually. Generally they remain fairly cordial. Their attitudes and demeanor are largely different. They barely even speak the same language, and when they do the dialects are completely foreign to each other. But the underlying school of thought remains the same for all of them. Simplicity within complexity.

Complexity is so fucking engulfing and completely unavoidable if you want to function within society. We surround ourselves with so many systems and hierarchies for definition. Our jobs and careers, our relationships with friends, family and strangers, our hobbies, our rules and regulations, our religions and organizations, our living spaces, our debts, our pasts, our futures, and the shit we own or want to own� they all have their skull ridden black labeled bottles and when stirred properly, a few sips can put the most seasoned of drunks into the detox tent for a few hours.

I feel I�ve made it through a nasty little storm with my propensity for simplicity. Not necessarily the simplicity of writing in ink over tapping plastic. Rather the continued value in separating and folding my problems into measurable piles and washing them accordingly. Fuck the labels, wash the socks and towels in hot water and bleach and everything else in cold water with soap. And while waiting for the dryer to buzz, I�d wake my inner drinking buddy, we�d call a bunch of friends and get tanked, just to make sure I wouldn�t sit there and wonder if maybe I should�ve read the labels.

The shit that came out fucked up finds a new home in the trash bin or some local second hand shop. The shit I can still wear gets rocked the next day.

The life of simplicity is actually something I fell into more than conjured, although I do feel the difference for me has been minimal. For years I�ve made everything I am and do seem so utterly unimportant and ridiculous. Modesty to a fault�

I remember when I was throwing parties (I know, I bring it up a lot� I consider it akin to a rather prominent branch on a sapling), I�d spend 4 or 5 hours personally calling everyone in my phone book (we�re talking hundreds) and inviting them separately, helping them deal with their problems and excuses in order to ensure they come and have a great fucking time.

As far as they were concerned, they were the select few who�d been invited personally. And in any meaningful respect, they were. I didn�t get those numbers from the white pages or various bathroom walls. And when the party was on, I would be in every corner of the party (bottle in hand to be unintimidating), ensuring every last patron was having the time of their life. Dude alone in the corner? Introduce him to a friendly chick. Chick alone in the corner? Talk to her for a few and introduce her to a mixed group. Drank too much? I�d be right there, holding their water (and their hair for the ladies), fending off the drunken comments ensuring them that it happens to everyone. Bad Trip? Talk em down and find their closest friends to help them through it.

And at the end of it all, the stories went on and on about the greatest party they�d ever been too, and I�m looked at as the biggest party animal on the planet. Little did they know I was working all night and for weeks prior. I�ve carried this sense of simplicity forward until I realized that the simplicity was less of a fa�ade than I�d given it credit for.

Eventually the work was no longer work. Eventually it all ran together as it was supposed to and I�d actually had fun throughout the planning stages and the actual night. All those calls and introductions and pep talks and whatever the fuck else made me lifelong friends and open doors. And I�ve carried that forward into my life and career� Simple.

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As an aside, I suppose the image of a mean bout of bloody knuckles was a bit harsh for yesterday�s post. It�s been the most easily and comfortably welcoming experience that my twisted head can place. And I figure a far better metaphor may have been thumb wrestling.